About

I am an Assistant Professor / Lecturer in Gender Studies at UCD specialising in Irish women’s / gender history.

I am the co-author on ‘We were There; 77 Women of the Easter Rising’ (Four Courts, 2016) and co-editor of ‘Kerry 1916; Histories and Legacies of the Easter Rising’ (IHP, 2016) and has also aspects of Irish women’s history, on gender and war, memory and history, oral history, social and political history, public history.

I am currently working on a biography of Margaret Skinnider, 1916 rebel, Cumann na mBan member, trade union and women’s rights activist, to be published by UCD Press in 2018/19. My other major project is on gendered and sexual violence during the Irish War of Independence and Civil War (1919-1923), which will be published in 2020.

I have been involved in a number of public history projects including the 1916 exhibitions and commemorative quilt project at Richmond Barracks and 1916 centenary exhibition at the Royal College of Surgeons. I continue her work with the Richmond Barracks heritage project, working on a 2018 event commemorating the 1918 extension of the franchise to women in Ireland #Votail100

I also contribute to history documentaries, radio, tv, news media and have an active online presence at @MaryMcAuliffe4 and @Womenof1916 as well as contributing to @Kerry1916book

As gender studies scholar and activist, I am engaged in campaigning for full and equal rights for women in Irish society. Part of this activism I see as the continuing battle for an equal space for women’s contributions, activism and stories in Irish history, and an equal contribution of women’s voices in Irish society, politics, media and all other areas. In pursuit of this I am an activist with Manel Watch Ireland @ManelWatchIre which is a collective of Irish women academics campaigning against the persistence of manels and the male ‘voice of authority’, and the continuity lack of gender parity in Irish academia, the arts, culture, media and wider society.